Pistoleer: Pirates Read online

  Eventually Robert ran out of news mainly because he kept quiet about the huge political changes that were coming about because of the House of Commons taking back its power from King Charlie, and because of the arrest by parliament of Lord Strafford, Charlie's demon Deputy in Ireland.

  "So one of my slave masters tells me that you have taken two of my Irish slaves aboard and are giving them sanctuary?" came the eventual question from Taylor.

  "They were being fired upon by muskets. Your slave master has much to learn about turning a profit from slavery."

  "That is more true than you know,” Taylor sighed, "but I try not to interfere with his meting out of punishments. We have had a lot of runaways lately."

  "Because of the Catholic colony on the Potomac River?"

  "Were it only so simple,” Taylor took another glug of rum before he continued. "Did you know that Virginia was originally settled by glass makers? I assure you this is true. When glass windows all became a must in the gentry's manors in England, the glassmakers began clear cutting the English forests to make charcoal coke for their glass furnaces. The original Virginia patent was to supply most of England's glass from here because the forests here are endless.

  That idea died when the Lords of Coal began supplying coal coke to the glass makers. They even passed a law that glass makers must use coal. Virginia no longer had a market for glass so they planted tobacco in its stead. Now we grow so much tobacco that the prices are dropping. Last year we burned a third of our fields rather than harvest them, all in the hope of driving the prices back up."

  "But I thought that the profit from tobacco was huge," Blake interrupted. "Surely it is always better to sell everything, even at a lower price."

  "Not when harvesting and curing take so much labour. To turn a profit from tobacco you need a cheap source of labour. At first we hired the Indians, but they were not dependable, so then we used forced, but they soon rebelled. The Powhatan rebellion cost us three hundred of our colonists back in '22, and the colony almost collapsed. At the time I was helping Lord Strafford create plantations in Ireland, successful plantations, so the King ordered me to Virginia to turn this failing colony around. The king assumed that the same tactics that worked in Ireland would work in Virginia. He was almost right.

  In Ireland we created false food shortages so that hunger would beget sickness and the sickness would weaken and impoverish the Irish clans. That was the tactic I began with in Virginia. Unfortunately, starving the Powhatan was impossible when there was so much food in the forests for the taking. I needed a new tactic and that was provided by a book that the governor loaned me. It was about the conquest of New Spain. In one paragraph it explained the devastation that cascaded through the cities of Mexico by our common children's diseases.

  I decided to make peace with the local chiefs by sending them gifts,” a satisfied grin crossed the mans face at the fond memory of his own cleverness. "The Powhatan men liked rum and their women liked colorful scarves so those were my gifts. Badly made rum and yellow scarves with the gack of our sick children on them. The rotgut rum sickened the men and blinded more than a few, but that was nothing compared to the effect that the scarves had on their villages. Measles you know."

  "I have heard the story of the measles plague before,” Robert interrupted. "How it leaves the children alive but devastates the elders. You did this... how long ago ... ten years?" He looked down to hide the flush of anger that washed across his face. If Daniel had been here, Taylor would be lying in a pool of his own blood by now. The next time he saw Alf Hancock he would tell him that his settlers were not responsible for the plague of measles. He shuddered at the thought that this demon Taylor had caused such horror on purpose.

  "Once the measles had weakened the clans,” Taylor pronounced, "it was time for more of the King's tactics from Ireland. In Ireland we wined and dined the clan leaders so as to keep them drunk while we took the horses away from their clansmen. Without horses the surprise attacks on our Irish plantations, ceased. It got so that their drunken leaders craved aqua vitae to the point where they would even trade land and women for more of it."

  "But with clans, whether here or in Ireland,” Robert pointed out, "most of the land is owned communally. The chiefs do not own the land, so they cannot sell it. Besides, the Powhatan have no horses and even if they did they would be of little use to them for their lands are cut off by rivers and inlets and marshes."

  "They use dugouts instead of horses," Taylor said, again smiling at his cleverness. "We took away their dugouts. It had the same effect because our towns are on islands and peninsulas. Without their dugouts they could not fish, could not trade, could not use them to escape us, and most importantly, they could not use them to make surprise attacks on our plantations.

  As for the communal land, well, in Ireland the King pronounced that all common land was ultimately crown land, and therefore the enclosure laws could be used to privatize it. Here, the Powhatans had no king, so Charles declared himself their king. As their self proclaimed king he declared that all common land was ultimately crown land. When a drunken Powhatan trades away some land, the governor accepts it in the name of the crown as if it had been enclosed. Such land becomes subject to the King's patents, and he gives his Lords the monopoly on such patents. Everyone makes a good profit, except of course, for the locals."

  Taylor glanced up at his guest's face and read the anger in it. In his defense he quickly added. "Is it our fault that the Indian and the Irish clan leaders can't hold their liquor. Besides, all of my tactics here in Virginia eventually failed. The Powhatan clansmen resisted the forced labour in our fields as strongly as the clansmen had in Ireland. You see, under Powhatan tradition, the men were the hunters and the women were the farmers, so the men took great offense when we forced them to work in the fields.

  Once that became known to us, we abided by their traditions and used their women in the fields rather than the men. A drunken Indian will trade his women for more rum, whereas the women rarely drink and they are hard workers. But even this tactic eventually failed. As soon as the rum ran out, the men wanted their women back. Bloody Indian givers. The women would escape back to their villages and there was no easy way of stopping them."

  It had taken all the time of this last story for Robert to recover his temper and to hide the loathing he had for this evil man with the syphilitic, bulbous face. How many other plantation managers thought like him? Probably all of them. They were living here in Virginia pretending to be Royals or Lords, and had convinced themselves that they were better than everyone else. Since Taylor seemed proud of his slaver deviltry, he prompted him with, "Go on."

  "No way of stopping the women running away, that is, until I emptied my purse to buy five African men from a Dutch trader,” Taylor's eyes shone bright with greed or perhaps lust. "I am using them as studs to breed the women that work in my fields. A woman with a half-black baby will not run back to her man, and better still, no woman will run away from her baby. Isn't that delicious. The women will be enslaved by their own babies. Don't you see. Since their own men will not claim the babies, then those babies belong to me, and therefore so do their mothers."

  Robert glanced over to where his cloak was hanging near the door, and at his pistols which hung beside it. This man deserved a pistol ball in the eye, but would killing him solve anything? Probably not. Where there is profit to be had, any success, no matter how immoral, is quickly copied. By now every plantation manager in Virginia may have copied Taylor's latest business strategy.

  He remembered the Irish girls he had rescued from the English slaver in Africa. "So you not only got the King's tactics from Ireland to work in Virginia, but you have improved on them. What is next? Will this new breeding strategy from Virginia be used in Ireland? Will black studs soon be covering Irish women in Limerick?"

  "Exactly!" Taylor bragged. "The King, or rather his Deputy of Ireland, Strafford, wants me to try breeding the Irish women here in Virginia first, befor
e they try it in Ireland. He is sending me some Irish women to breed. In truth they should be arriving any day now.

  Before we dare risk such cross breeding on our Irish plantations we must first find out whether the Irish men will disown their women for bearing a half-black baby. If so, then we have the ultimate solution for our plantations everywhere. Once a bond slave disowns his woman then that woman's bond will be void and she will become a chattel slave." The mans voice was positively joyous. "Don't you understand. Any child, male or female, born of a chattel woman is also a chattel slave ... by law.

  In truth, I no longer care if it works in Ireland, for I am quite sure that it will work in Virginia. Once I have enough half-blacks to work my plantations, then I will no longer have a need for Irish or Powhatan slaves. They can run off and starve in the woods for all I care. You must see the beauty of it. The half-black chattel slaves will have no where to run, no identity, no culture, no anything except the knowledge of how to be my obedient slave and how to grow tobacco for my profit."

  "Brilliant,” Robert almost choked on the word and took a sip of the rum to hide his cough. Perhaps he should have brought Daniel after all.

  "By the way, do you have any African men or Irish women on your ship? If so I will buy them from you."

  "Just English settlers on their way to Massachusetts."

  "Good enough. We need more settlers here,” Taylor said. "We have over four thousand slaves in Virginia, but less than a thousand settlers. If there is another rebellion, like in '22, or if the Irish and the Powhatan ever join together against us, then we will be slaughtered. If you will drop your settlers here I will pay top shilling for their passage bond."

  "Umm, I don't think that would work. They are religious pilgrims on their way to Plymouth."

  "Bloody Brownists then?" Taylor confirmed. "You are right. That would not work. Free thinkers, abolitionists, and republicans. Trouble makers all. We only want good Church of England stock here. If I had known they were Brownists, I would not have allowed them off your ship."

  "Speaking of the ship and of Plymouth,” Robert ventured, for he had listened to this man's immoral stories for long enough. Now it was his turn to choose the topic. "This is my first voyage to the New World, whereas you must have crossed dozens of times. I would welcome any advice from such an experienced captain as yourself."

  "How did you come?" Taylor asked. "By way of the Caribbean or by way of Newfoundland? No, don't answer. By the Caribbean of course, otherwise you would no longer have your Pilgrims aboard. After you drop your Pilgrims in Plymouth, then come back south to here before you set a course east. The Florida current that brought you north turns north-east when it hits the barrier islands off Pamlico Sound.

  It is a wide current that pushes ships all the way to Europe. If you sail on this side of it you will be taken to England. If you sail on the other side of it you will be taken to Spain. It's a long, but sure, way to England but there is no land unless you happen upon the island of Bermuda. Don't count on it. In all of my crossings I found Bermuda only twice. To find Bermuda, you must use your astrolabe to keep you just above 32 degrees of latitude as you sail due east. This is almost impossible because the current keeps pushing you north east and off course."

  "You asked if I had come by way of Newfoundland?" If Robert remembered his charts correctly, Newfoundland was a large island dotted with fishing colonies somewhere in the far north. "Is that a faster way to come from England than by way of the Caribbean?"

  "So the French captains all tell me, though they themselves sail to Cape Breton rather than Newfoundland,” Taylor replied. "I have sailed via Newfoundland only once. After all, it makes more sense for Virginia bound ships to come by way of Africa and take on slaves, and by the Caribbean to take on molasses. The time I came by Newfoundland was only because we had missed the season for the African trade winds. I have never been so cold in all my life. The sea near Newfoundland has floating hills made of ice."

  With a shrug Daniel ignored the myths of this old captain. Hills of floating ice, indeed. "Why not just sail straight across from England? Why go so far north and risk the cold and the storms?"

  "Well first of all, despite the cold, most of Newfoundland is at the same latitude as Brittany in France and therefore is actually to the south of Cornwall. Perhaps you with your lateen rig could sail straight to Virginia, but not so with a standard square rig. Even your lateen would find it slow going because on that course you would be fighting the great current that wants takes you back to Europe.

  From Bristol you sail west under Ireland, and then set a course northwest until you are across that current. You can keep the same tack all the way, and you will be surprised at how far north the current will take you. As soon as you are across the great current you must turn south west. If not you will founder on the ice islands in the heavy fog that always hides them. There is a current from the north that causes the fog and pushes the ice islands south, and it will push you to Newfoundland."

  "What is the trade there?" A standard question by any sea captain. Even a small trade can cut the cost of a passage.

  "Fish of course ... cod...salted cod. They'll trade it for molasses or rum, for metal of any type, for hemp rope, for salt, or for women. Especially women." Taylor shut his mouth with the snap of a cod for he had just realized that he had told this amiable captain a valuable secret long kept by French navigators. English captains had still to realize that the fastest way to Massachusetts was by way of Newfoundland. Their ships still fought the great warm current all the way across the Atlantic. Damn, and he had bleated it out like a child eager to please. "What about my two sweet Irish children? Did they come off the ship with the others?"

  "My passengers have given them sanctuary, for they abhor and reject slavery in all its forms."

  "Brownists gave sanctuary to Catholics!" Taylor spoke in amazement. "Surely you jest?"

  "They are a very young and comely pair. They told my women passengers that you wanted the girl as a bed warmer, and that you have the French pox."

  "They shouldn't have said that," Taylor whispered while his face grew red in anger and embarrassment. "For years I have kept the gentleman's rule that those with the pox must sleep only with those with the pox. It would be a disaster if my black studs caught it. But that girl, well you have seen her. So young, so innocent, so fresh, so thin. Too delicate for field work or to be spitted by my blacks. So childlike. I must have her. You must return her. Keep the lad, but return her to me."

  "Of course, dear sir,” Robert replied. "After all, what other fate will await her at Saint Mary's? A Catholic slave master who will bed her as soon as she steps ashore."

  "Not if she steps ashore into the arms of their accursed Jesuit." Taylor's anger was washing away his embarrassment. "Curse the troublemaker. He keeps the runaways from returning to slavery by having them work for the church until they can make their own way."

  "I tell yee what. On our last day here, in the confusion while my passengers are boarding, I will have my crew drop her on the far bank of the creek. Now, can you quote me a good price on some barrels of tobacco? Or on some of this rum?"

  "I can quote you in silver shillings, but a quote in barrels of molasses would be more profitable for both of us."

  "Molasses then,” Robert replied. They had taken on some molasses at a Dutch sugar plantation on TerTholen in the Virgin Islands. The best trades for a small ship were always goods-for-goods. Goods-for-silver then silver-for-goods was never as profitable.

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  The Pistoleer - Pirates by Skye Smith Copyright 2013-14

  Chapter 6 - Sanctuary in Saint Mary's Cittie in July 1641

  "It was a good thing you stayed aboard with the watch and did not go with me to meet Tom Taylor,” Robert told Daniel as soon as he was back on board the Swift, "otherwise the king's man would be dead by now."

  "Like that slaver captain in Africa then, was he?"

  "Could have been rai
sed on the same tit. Why would anyone appoint such a despicable snake of a man to a position where he can spread so much evil?"

  "I think you just answered your own question,” Daniel sniffed. "Who else would you hire to whip slaves into growing something they couldn't eat? Certainly not a Puritan or an Anabaptist."

  "Well Taylor is a demon. It surprises me that Earl Warwick uses him as his agent here in Virginia. The Warwick I have met is strongly Presbyterian, and I always assumed he was an ethical and moral man."

  "And you let such an evil man as Taylor survive your visit? No nasty accident?" Daniel replied only half in jest.

  "Perhaps it is the evil that has shaped him, not he that shaped the evil,” Robert said in his best Oxford College doublespeak. "Perhaps the source of the evil is the need to show profits from the plantations. That said, however, evil is as evil does. He explained that the plantation managers steal the land by clearing the local clans off it, which leaves the clansmen hungry and without means. When they are hungry enough the managers force them to work on the plantations. It seems that the two things that a plantation needs to make a good profit is forced labour, and a monopoly patent granted by the King.

  Of course the owners, such as Warrick, live in their palaces far away, while the hired managers run the plantations. With the true owners far away so that the locals cannot deal out some vengeful justice to them, the best the locals can do is to avenge themselves on the managers. The need to occasionally replace a murdered manager will be considered just another cost of doing business to the owners. It explains why the managers are so ruthless with troublemakers. Apparently they give new colonists one of two choices, work for the plantation company or leave. The profits are sent to the absent owners rather than spent locally, so it's not like the new colonists can start their own business. The whole plantation economy scheme is as immoral as it is ingenious. Ingeniously evil."